Personal attack only refuge of too many angry but misguided critics

Personal attack only refuge of too many angry but misguided critics: "Weekend before last, when it opened, I sat in a crowded theater in Boston for a Saturday afternoon matinee showing of Michael Moore's latest film, 'Fahrenheit 9/11.' Like others in the crowd, I alternately chuckled and gasped, and overall enjoyed the show. But it was, in my book, a guilty pleasure.
Readers of this column know that I have been a critic, early and often, of the administration's handling of the war on terror and of the war in Iraq. Why, then, did I leave the theater after 'Fahrenheit 9/11' feeling ambivalent?
Not all, but much of what Moore does is what we long ago learned to call the ad hominem argument. Ad hominem literally means you go for the man, you attack the person or the people rather than debate and argue the issues. True, Moore raises issues and often eloquently so. But when all is said and done, 'Fahrenheit 9/11' is a scorching personal attack on George W. Bush and others in his administration. Bush is presented as, alternately, a bumbling simpleton and the evil genius behind an international conspiracy of wealthy manipulators. One might wonder if one person can be both a simpleton and an arch conspirator?"


ANTHONY B. ROBINSON
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER COLUMNIST